Malaysian Appreciation Dinner with Matrade and Malaysian Kitchen Program

The World Loves Melbourne was honoured to receive an invitation from Matrade, the Malaysian body responsible for promoting and developing Malaysia's foreign trade, to the Appreciation Dinner at the Marriott Hotel. The Malaysian Kitchen program is a global initiative to educate and inform people about Malaysian cuisine. Furthermore, this was an Appreciation Dinner, thanking people of the city of Melbourne and in particular the media, for their support of Malaysia in a tough year.

The Welcome speech by Dato' Dr Mohamad Rameez Yahaya was a highlight. Malaysian cuisine is a key cuisine in our city of Melbourne (as The World Loves Melbourne can attest to). There are some 224 Malaysian restaurants in Australia, with Melbourne a big part of the scene. Aussies love Malaysian cuisine for its flavour and health benefits - fresh quality food. With food playing a large part, Malaysia has doubled its exports to Australia in the last 5 years, and should double again in the next three years. Supermarkets also play a key role, with some 200 product lines from Malaysia in our supermarkets.

The World Loves Melbourne enjoyed the 20 quality dishes served to us at the Appreciation Dinner, including the platter of skewers with chicken satay skewers, beef with soy chilli honey skewers, and lamb Assam skewers (top above). Also pictured above is the Crispy school prawns - an absolute highlight! Pictured immediately above, we enjoyed this delicious roti.

The World Loves Melbourne enjoyed the texture and taste of this Turkey rendang dish, as well as the grilled vegetables pictured behind it.

Another favourite was the Mee Goreng noodles (which also went superbly with the turkey dish).

The World Loves Melbourne has only visited Malaysia once but hopes to return again. We are big fans of Malaysian people and Malaysian cuisine.

Rojak buah with joak petis and crushed peanuts was an exotic treat. As was the Sago Gula Melaka.

We didn't expect plum pudding, but it was welcomed, with fresh berries on top!

The Malaysian feast was wonderful and generous in every way!

The World Loves Melbourne would like to thank Matrade for inviting us to the outstanding MKP Appreciation Dinner.